Catamaran (Ship)
Description The Catamaran is a very small craft, commonly used as an escape vessel or for short pleasure trips. It has two parallel hulls, connected by perpendicular struts to hold the craft together. Its tall, broad sail and light construction makes the vessel very maneuverable. The Catamaran uses nearby gravitational forces to maneuver and propel itself, and lacks any sort of true helm (while a helm could be installed on a Catamaran, the cost of even the cheapest helm is much greater than the cost of the Catamaran itself, so this is extremely rare). While within 40 hexes of a planetary body of size A or larger, a Catamaran with a full crew of 2 has SR 4 and MC B. If the craft is farther away from a large source of gravity, the ship's SR is reduced to 1 and MC drops to D. If the Catamaran is manned by only a single crewman, the SR is halved (minimum SR 1), and MC drops 2 steps. In order to maneuver the craft, the crew members must lean far over the side to take advantage of the pull of gravity, using the wind resistance of the sail to angle and maneuver the ship in the desired direction. If the sail of the Catamaran is ever removed or badly damaged due to a critical hit or a direct hit, the craft's maneuverability drops to G and it moves in a straight line at its last SR. It should be noted that this method of propulsion makes it impossible for a Catamaran to launch into space from a planetary body, unless that planetary body has a flat gravity plane that the Catamaran can sail out along. Whenever a Catamaran is hit in combat, all crew members must roll a dexterity check (penalized by the ship's current SR) to stay aboard. Those who fail fall through the ship's gravity plane, and are lost at the end of the next round. A single hit from most large weapons is sufficient to destroy a Catamaran outright, and even a good hit with a light ballista could cause the craft to break up. When the ship breaks up, due to its small size and fragile construction, only 1d2 large, atmosphere-sustaining pieces will be left. Crew A Catamaran requires 2 crew to handle it properly; more than its tonnage can safely support for long journeys. In fact, a Catamaran will often carry as many as a half-dozen passengers, since the ship is only intended for very short trips in the first place, making air and food considerations moot. Ship Uses Escape Craft: Many larger ships carry one or more Catamarans for use as escape craft. These Catamarans are useful only if the parent craft suffers an accident close to a safe planetary body or friendly ship, since a long journey in such a ship is impossible. Pleasure Craft: Most Catamarans are used as small personal yachts, particularly by inhabitants of asteroid cities. Within fairly dense asteroid belts, such ships can be used for short hops from one asteroid to another. In these asteroid belts, a Catamaran can be a convenient and cheap method of transportation for small groups, but more often it is instead used purely for pleasure. Several asteroid cities host regular Catamaran races around the asteroid for the amusement of the citizens. Other Configurations Catamarans are often customized for appearance and speed, but these modifications have little to no real effect on the ship's performance. The tiny ship cannot be effectively stripped (since it is already stripped of all non-essential weight), topped out (since it is effectively already topped-out), or have its hull thickened (since it has no cargo space to eliminate). While a Catamaran could theoretically be armour-plated, such a modification would reduce the craft's SR as well as MC, and as such would be highly unpopular at best.